During the rise of pelagic whaling carried on from vessels of various nationalities, New Zealand's first locally based whaling commenced at two small shore stations, at Te Awaiti, in Tory Channel, Cook Strait, and at Rakituma, in Preservation Inlet, in 1829. The former was at a site which is only a few hundred yards from that of the modern factory of today. During the 1830s operators from New South Wales and elsewhere established shore stations along many other parts of the New Zealand coast, particularly around the South Island coast from Preservation Inlet to Timaru. John Jones owned several Otago and Southland stations and the Weller Brothers station in Otago Harbour has become one of the best known through descriptions left us in correspondence and in diaries. Other stations were set up along the remaining part of the east coast of the South Island with major concentrations of small groups on Banks Peninsula and in the Cook Strait area from Port Underwood to Kapiti Island. Further north “Dicky” Barrett operated for a few years in the late 1830s from Sugarloaf Islands near New Plymouth. His was the only station established along the west coast of the North Island, north of Kapiti. Many groups formed small shore stations along the east coast of the North Island, particularly in the Mahia Peninsula area and around East Cape into Bay of Plenty during the late 1830s and early 1840s.

Shore establishments required only a small capital outlay for the relatively simple equipment. Trypots, windlasses, knives, and barrels were the main requirements, together with two or more longboats per party for the actual catching. As the work was seasonal, whalers did not depend entirely on their catch for a living. Thus whaling was a supplement to farming or other activities during the rest of the year. For this reason small stations could exist on catches as low as two or three right whales per season and still find the venture worth while. There were nearly a hundred small shore parties in the peak years of 1843 to 1845, and the oil and whalebone they exported indicates that their total catch per season was then of the order of 400 right whales. To these must be added the hundreds of right whales killed by pelagic whalers off shore and in the bays where ships' boats were often in direct competition with those of the shore whalers.

The inevitable decline of right whales rapidly affected shore as well as pelagic whalers. Many southern parties stopped hunting in the early 1840s, and in other regions there was a progressive reduction from 1845 to 1849. At the Auckland Islands there was an unsuccessful attempt to establish a whaling industry in 1849. The Enderby settlement was founded from England, but it was poorly organised and, proving a complete failure, was closed within two years.

From 1850 to the early twentieth century right whales were caught from shore in small numbers intermittently by various parties operating with open boats from Kaikoura, Tory Channel, and the Mahia to Bay of Plenty area, but their catches remained uniformly small.

Pelagic whalers, however, could still hunt on the high seas for sperm whales which had not been so severely decimated. Some American sperm whalers called at northern ports until the turn of the century and up to 20 were entered annually in the 1870s at the Bay of Islands and a smaller number at Mangonui. There were some attempts to found a local pelagic industry by New Zealand owned vessels based on Auckland (e.g., Albion, Especulador, and Magellan Cloud) and on Dunedin (e.g., Othello, Splendid, and Chance). These vessels were not sufficiently successful to encourage larger scale efforts along the lines of whaling from Tasmania where a peak of some 60 locally owned vessels were in the Pacific Ocean. The New Zealand vessels are remembered most from Frank Bullen's service on the Splendid which resulted in his masterpiece The Cruise of the Cachalot.

The next phase of New Zealand whaling developed after a change to humpback catching by New Zealand shore parties. A few humpbacks were taken by some shore parties as early as 1837 when John Wade's catch at Palliser Bay included 10 humpbacks and two right whales. Humpbacks also formed a significant part of the catch from stations along the east coast of the North Island, where the whalers at Te Kaha (Bay of Plenty) were able to carry on with open-boat catching until the 1930s by adding humpbacks to the occasional right whales they caught.

Whaling commenced in New Zealand waters only 22 years after Captain Cook's first voyage to New Zealand. The first recorded whale ship was the William and Ann under the command of Captain William Bunker, who called at Doubtless Bay in 1791 during a sperm-whaling voyage in the Pacific Ocean. His was the forerunner of a large number of ships of different nationalities which either whaled in New Zealand waters or called at the ports for provisioning as part of sperm-whaling operations during the following hundred years.

During 1801 there were reports of three sperm whalers which returned from the New Zealand grounds as full ships, while six others were still operating off northern New Zealand as pelagic whalers, that is, catching off shore in the open ocean. By 1805 vessels were calling regularly at the Bay of Islands primarily for taking on water and any fresh food which could be bartered from the local Maoris, but, at the same time, some Maoris were occasionally taken on as members of the crew and the development of the Bay of Islands as a provisioning, refitting, and recruiting centre had commenced.

Despite the great predominance of American whalers (from New England ports) in the Pacific Ocean throughout the nineteenth century, it was British and Australian whalers who dominated whaling in New Zealand waters until 1835. American whalers had been excluded from Australian ports until 1831, and for a considerable time they operated mainly in the eastern, mid, and north Pacific closer to other bases. Meanwhile, British and colonial spermwhaling vessels in New Zealand waters increased steadily. During one month, March 1833, 27 British and colonial vessels, mainly whalers, were recorded at the Bay of Islands. Substantial numbers of whalers from France and a few from Bremen and Portugal added to the above. Occasional American whalers had called during the early nineteenth century, but from 1835 American whalers arrived in rapidly increasing numbers to join in the right whale fishery established shortly before in bays. They also hunted right whales off shore as well as sperm whales on the high seas.

In the peak year, 1839, Clendon, the American Consul at the Bay of Islands, entered 62 American ships and, although this included a few repeat visits in the year, many American whale ships used other New Zealand ports. Some vessels caught whales off shore from New Zealand but did not enter any New Zealand ports. It is impossible to give a precise figure for the total number of vessels which whaled off New Zealand during 1839, but it was probably of the order of 150 American and up to 50 or more vessels of other nationalities. This is much less than the clearly inaccurate figure of 600 American vessels off New Zealand, sometimes quoted (the peak fleet for the entire Pacific Ocean was 760), but it nevertheless shows that whaling was being carried out on a very substantial scale. Annual catches for individual vessels ranged from nil to 10 or more, but returns were usually recorded in barrels of oil instead of numbers of whales. It is a hazardous exercise to attempt to estimate the total number of whales caught per year, but in a few peak years this probably exceeded 1,000 whales (both sperm and right) in New Zealand waters.

Pelagic whaling dropped sharply in 1841, the year following the Treaty of Waitangi which established British sovereignty, with the accompaniment of port dues and excise duties. But it rose to a second and lower peak in 1846 and then declined to a relatively small scale as right whales had become depleted around New Zealand and new whaling grounds for sperm and other whales had been opened up elsewhere.

Humpback whales grow to about 48 ft in length, but their baleen plates are much shorter and coarser than those of right whales and have never been of much commercial value. Humpbacks are caught primarily for oil, as adults processed by modern methods produce 10 or more tons each. In recent years, however, the meat has become important for pet food and meat meal. Humpbacks pass New Zealand annually in winter and spring when they migrate north to tropical breeding grounds and in late spring they return south to the Antarctic feeding grounds. Many travel relatively close to shore while they pass New Zealand and some have been caught in past years by New Zealand shore stations. As they were less valuable and harder to catch from open boats than southern right whales, small numbers only were taken during the nineteenth century.

The large, fast-swimming fin and blue whales, which form the greatest part of the Antarctic factoryship catch today, tend to avoid coastlines, and New Zealand shore whalers have caught a total of less than 10 individuals. Many small species, such as pilot whales, dolphins, and beaked whales occur, but they have never been hunted commercially in New Zealand waters.

The southern right whale reaches 50 ft in length, with females slightly larger than males. Instead of teeth, they possess 300 or more horny plates up to 6 ft in length suspended from the upper jaw where their bristlelike inner edges are used to filter small shrimplike animals from the sea. The plates, known as baleen or “whalebone”, were once in great demand for umbrella and corset ribs, upholstery packing, and other uses which raised the price to a peak of £2,000 per ton. Three whales could produce a ton of baleen which was therefore frequently much more valuable than the oil produced per whale, despite the very high oil production of this species. Southern right whales had regular seasonal migrations from sub-Antarctic waters, where they fed in summer, to a belt between 30°S and 45S where they came to breed in winter and spring. In this belt they occurred both on the high seas and close inshore where many females produced their calves. Hunting, therefore, occurred from vessels ranging considerable distances off shore, from others at bay anchorages, and also from a large number of open boats based on shore stations. Indiscriminate hunting included the slaughter of cows and calves and caused a rapid decline in the 20 years from 1830 to 1850 to very low numbers from which the stocks have not built up. Despite strict protection during most of this century, the southern right whale is still a very rare animal.

Sperm whales are the largest of all toothed whales (which include dolphins and porpoises) with males sometimes exceeding 60 ft in length and females up to about 40 ft. They feed mainly on giant squid which occur most abundantly in the deep waters of all oceans. Sperm whaling was therefore carried out mainly from vessels operating some distance off shore or over the deep submarine trenches which approach the New Zealand coast at various points. Sperm oil and the spermacetic wax, which was once in such great demand for high-quality candles, are the main products of this whale, with ambergris (used for perfumes) as an occasional but formerly very valuable by-product. These whales were the primary quarry of pelagic sailing ships from 1791–1880, but have never formed a significant part of the catch of New Zealand shore stations. They are still hunted in the Antarctic Ocean, the North Pacific, and off shore from South America, but in the waters off New Zealand relatively few were caught after 1850 and only a negligible number after 1880, until the development in 1963 of a shore-based sperm whale industry in Cook Strait. This ended in 1965.

Throughout its history the nature and scope of New Zealand whaling have been influenced primarily by the local abundance and the habits of three species of whale, namely the sperm, southern right, and humpback. It is therefore necessary to distinguish clearly the relevant differences between these three mammals.

Both these terms are a little ambiguous because different people may apply them to quite a variety of crustacean plankton including some larval forms which are, or in some cases are thought to be, eaten by whales. All the larger whales, with the exception of the sperm whale, are quite without teeth and rely for their food on plankton, which are extracted from the water by the “whalebone” filtering mechanism attached to the upper jaw. The true krill, food of the blue and fin whales, is a large shrimplike form known as a Euphausid, and it was found by the early Discovery investigators that the presence of krill was a very good indicator that whales might also be present. Smaller whales, such as the sei whale, are content with the rather smaller copepod, Calanus. An interesting Euphausid is often found in New Zealand waters – Nyctiphanes, Greek for “night light”. Usually this species, in common with many other plankton, prefers deeper water in the daytime, but at night rises to the surface where it produces bright pinpoints of light in disturbed water such as the wake of a vessel. Sometimes a trawl net when raised from the water at night is covered with Nyctiphanes, and the effect is like a Christmas tree covered with hundreds of tiny candles.

by Richard Morrison Cassie, M.SC.(N.Z.), D.SC.(AUCK.), Senior Lecturer in Zoology, University of Auckland.

The Whakatane River rises in the heavily forested Urewera Country some 3 ½ miles west-north-west from Lake Waikaremoana. Adjacent watersheds are Rangitaiki to the west, the Mohaka to the south, and the Wairoa to the south-east. Ruatahuna lies beside the Whakatane River only 6 miles north of its southern watershed, and here the river is crossed by the Rotorua-Waikaremoana main highway in a more or less extensive clearing in the dense forest. The main part of the river lies in the angle of a major fault which is a northern extension of the Wellington fault. The rocks of the catchment are mainly Triassic and Jurassic greywackes, sparsely fossiliferous, with some Tertiary sandstones at Ruatahuna.

The Bay of Plenty coastal plain extends as a broad valley some distance up the Whakatane River, but above this the river flows through gorge-like topography. It floods more or less seriously once or twice a year, inundating about 1,000 acres of land. The catchment area is 601 sq. miles, with minimum flows of about 200 cusecs, and flood flows of about 30,000 cusecs.

by Thomas Ludovic Grant-Taylor, M.SC., New Zealand Geological Survey, Lower Hutt.

Whakatane is situated on the eastern bank of the Whakatane River mouth in the Bay of Plenty. The business section of the town extends along the waterfront below the precipitous slopes of a hilly promontory called Whakatane Heads. The main residential area occupies alluvial flats immediately upstream. To the east and south-east of the district the land rises to hills, but elsewhere comprises level plain. The Bay of Plenty branch railway terminates at Taneatua (9 miles south). A railway station at Whakatane West (6 miles south-west) serves the town. By road Whakatane is 61 miles south-east of Tauranga, 57 miles northeast of Rotorua, 20 miles north-east of Kawerau, and 39 miles north-west of Opotiki. Whakatane is a river port with facilities at the town for vessels of light draught.

The main farming activities of the district are dairying and fat-lamb production. Cheese is made at Ruatoki (15 miles south) and butter at Edgecumbe (11 miles south-west). Lime is quarried at Awakeri (7 miles south-west) where there are also developed hot springs. The exotic forests of the Kaingaroa Plain are located within 12–30 miles south-west and logs are hauled to Whakatane for milling. There is a large cardboard and container-board factory on the west bank of the Whakatane River opposite Whakatane. Wooden boxes are manufactured at Piripai (about 1 mile west). There are sawmills and a timber-treatment plant at Edgecumbe. Whakatane is the principal commercial and industrial centre of the Rangitaiki area of the Bay of Plenty district. Town industrial activities include the manufacture of joinery and furniture, concrete products, and knitwear; bacon and ham processing; sawmilling; and general engineering. There is a popular marine resort at Ohope Beach (4 miles east).

According to Maori tradition Toi te Huatahi, later known as Toi Kairakau, landed at Whakatane, A.D. c. 1150, in search of his grandson, Whatonga. Failing to find Whatonga, he decided to settle in the locality and built a pa on the highest point of the headland now called Whakatane Heads, overlooking the present town. Some 200 years later Mataatua, one of the canoes of the Great Migration, landed at Whakatane. Motuhora Island (6–7 miles north-west) provided shelter for Cook'sEndeavour in 1769. Flax traders are believed to have visited the locality in the early 1800s. The Church Missionary Society's vessel Herald visited Whakatane in 1828. During March 1829 the trading brig Hawes was captured by local Maoris off Motuhora Island, brought into the river and looted. Philip Tapsell became established at Whakatane as a trader in the 1830s. During 1865 the schooner Kate was cut off at Whakatane by local Hauhau converts who murdered James Fulloon, the master, and two of the crew. This outrage led to the temporary military occupation of the settlement. Te Kooti's Hauhaus sacked Whakatane in 1869 before being driven back into the mountainous Urewera Country.

In addition to agriculture, flaxmilling became an important activity towards the end of the century and fibre was shipped out by scows from Thornton (5 miles north-west) and Whakatane. About 1890 the Rangitaiki Plain area was opened for settlement, but large tracts were unfarmable because of swamps. The Government took over the drainage work in terms of the Rangitaiki Land Drainage Act 1910 and, since 1911, have converted most of the area into farming land. Dairying commenced with the establishment of a cheese factory at Opouriao (12 miles south) in February 1899. The railway planned originally to link Gisborne with the North Island Main Trunk line was opened for traffic through Whakatane West to Taneatua on 2 September 1928. Whakatane was constituted a borough in 1917. The name Whakatane commemorates an incident occurring after the arrival of the Mataatua. The men had gone ashore and the canoe began to drift. Wairaka, a chieftainess, said “Ka Whaka tane au i ahau” (“I will make myself a man”), and commenced to paddle, and with the help of the other women saved the canoe. (There are other versions.)

POPULATION: 1951 census, 3,777; 1956 census, 5,445; 1961 census, 7,169.

by Brian Newton Davis, M.A., Vicar, St. Philips, Karori West, Wellington and Edward Stewart Dollimore, Research Officer, Department of Lands and Survey, Wellington.

(Deinacrida spp., Pachyrhamma spp., Hemideina spp., etc.).

These wingless orthopteran insects are well represented in New Zealand and are found in the forest and in caves. The commonest weta is found throughout the country in rotten logs, in old tree trunks, and under bark. It has a body length of about 5 cm and has much longer antennae. The male is characterised by its large black head. The general colouration of the insect is dark brown. It is capable of making a peculiar scraping sound by rubbing its hind legs against ridges on the side of its body. Although it appears to be a fearsome creature, it is harmless but can give a nip with its mandibles if incautiously handled.

Giant wetas are now rare and appear to be restricted to several off-shore islands. They are heavy insects with a body of up to 10 cm in length and with powerful spined hind legs. They are nocturnal and feed on foliage of trees and on grass. Wetas can run very quickly and jump great distances. They are seldom seen in daylight but feed at night, mainly on plants.

Cave wetas are found a short distance inside caves and tunnels. They are small wetas with a body length of up to 30 mm, but they are characterised by their extremely long legs and antennae. The length from tip of antennae to the end of hind leg can be up to 40 cm and the antennae may consist of over 500 segments. Cave wetas lay eggs, up to 20 at a time, in soft mud along the walls of the caves. The life cycle is about two years.

In New Zealand the Maori name “weta” is popularly applied to insects of the Order Orthoptera, which belong to two families, the Henicidae of Karny 1937, and the Rhaphidophoridae of Kirby 1883. The former includes the tree or ground wetas and the “taipos” of the West Coast of the South Island, the name of which to the Maori means “the devil who comes by night”. The latter includes the insects generally known as “cave wetas”.

by Roy Alexander Harrison, D.SC., Senior Lecturer in Agricultural Zoology, Lincoln Agricultural College.